


This Wasn't How It Was Supposed to Go

by mydogfoundthechainsaw



Category: National Football League RPF
Genre: Explicit Language, M/M, Wes is a fucking mastermind, sad tom is sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-03
Updated: 2014-02-03
Packaged: 2018-01-17 11:09:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1385425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydogfoundthechainsaw/pseuds/mydogfoundthechainsaw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the moments after the AFC Championship game, Tom thinks about his relationship. With a little planning, maybe everything will turn out for the best.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Wasn't How It Was Supposed to Go

**Author's Note:**

> Just fyi, in case you couldn't figure this all out, this is fictional. The people aren't mine and I'm not making a profit. Just for fun. Is that what I'm supposed to say? This is cross-posted to LJ, and I know it's way past season.

      It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Not again. As the cameras flashed around him, he could already hear the critics. It wasn’t that he cared—he was Tom fucking Brady, after all—but they’d always loved Peyton. Even when they questioned his ability in the clutch. Well, he’d certainly disproved that theory over the past two games, hadn’t he? And now Tom got to watch him play against the young ones who were supposed to replace them. Like they ever could. The game was changing, yes, quarterbacks getting more mobile, but they had been the best for so long that these new young bloods could never match their dynasty. Kapernick and Wilson had his respect yes, but he wasn’t about to crown them the next them.  
     And that was, of course, when he saw him. Peyton was kind of hard to miss, with that huge forehead, that loud Southern drawl, that curling lip that always seemed to be on the verge of smirking. He used to love watching that, watching him. Trying to see what he could say or do to make that smirk emerge. He was funny, even if he didn’t seem like it on the field, and that vibrancy is what had made them click.  
    But it’d been a while since they’d clicked. And so when they shook hands, for just a second, he didn’t expect the butterflies. He felt young and stupid again, like the first time they’d met. Yet after years of this, he knew how to deal. And Peyton did too. He muttered something encouraging, but Tom wasn’t paying attention. He was savoring the feel of closeness, which he wouldn’t get for another season. It lasted less than a second, but cameras were flashing and people were watching and teammates were getting antsy. Someone would notice if he spent five hours, like he wanted to, talking to Peyton. Even if Peyton never said a word back. Someone would comment something, and he—they’d—be screwed. Look what had happened to Aaron.  
     So he left, trudging back to the locker room in silence, shaking hands quickly. He spent a little more time with Wes, who seemed to always know what was happening in his head. Of course, Wes was always good with relationships, even if he tried not to show it. Apparently, he was trying to work his magic here, a mile high, on two of the players. Tom could never remember which ones. He thought they were receivers, but at the end of the day, that didn’t matter. They’d never be able to show it, just like he and Peyton had found out. But Wes was a romantic, and seemed intent on getting them, and he and Peyton, together.  
    And up a mile high, all he could see was that putrid orange. It’d be an ugly Super Bowl, no matter who won the later game. The fans were loud here, and passionate, though that wasn’t what screwed him up. Two long passes, flying too far in front of receivers, all because who was standing on the sidelines. Of course it was him, on the other side, daring to ignore Tom’s team, only focusing on the next outing, daring to congratulate Pot Roast when he sacked him, to smile when Champ fucked up one of Tom’s plans. It’d never been this bad, but apparently in his old—in football years—age, he’d grown sentimental. Last game against them he’d suffered too, but the urge to shove it down Peyton’s throat had overtaken him second half. Here, that urge had never come out. Being here, in Peyton’s place, as he was reminded by all the fans wearing the “18,” made some part of him die. But it certainly wasn’t the Southern boy’s fault. He wasn’t one to blame others. Peyton’s offense had certainly played well, while multiple levels of the Patriots team hadn’t really shown up. Like him.  
     Soon, though, his team crowded the locker room. Belichick was talking, complaining about Wes’s hit on Talib. He strove to pay attention. Belichick and Wes had never gotten along. Part of it was just Wes, of course, who loved screwing around with people, who chafed under Belichick’s ideas of control. Perhaps he’d found a better place with Peyton—he had always loved to play pranks on him, especially when they’d just met. But he’d always thought that it was partly because Wes was the only one who’d truly understood him. Not like the others knew—Gronk would never let it go, he knew—but still, it was undeniable that Tom wasn’t like the rest of them. All the Uggs deals and supermodels in the world couldn’t disguise that. They were just never brave enough to ask about it. Not like he would’ve said, not in the early days. Now? Now he might. Just to see who was his friend.  
    He changed quickly, into some outfit Giselle had picked out. And he went, head held high, to the press conference, each step imagining Peyton’s smile, stoic as always, during the celebration. No one would ever see how wide and open, how happy and free, he could look, not like he had. It was all simpler when they were younger. Coming off Peyton’s recovery, things had changed. Perhaps. He wasn’t sure when the collapse had begun; only that he was left, here, struggling with a broken heart and a broken team. And it burned him, to the bone. He was okay with not being liked by the public—they were only jealous anyways—but Peyton? The man he’d admired, trusted, loved, from the moment he’d seen him? The man who was his first, and truly, only love, other than football? The man who’d always seen the potential within him, and always believed? The man who said they’d never let teams get in the way? Yet he was the one who ended it. It seemed the neck surgery had given him a new outlook on life. It was easier, in Peyton’s head, to deal with a broken heart and Ashley, who’d known about them for forever, than to deal with having Tom in his life. But Peyton’s head had always been a strange place, and he’d be the first to admit he was never quite sure how it all fit together.  
   He went through the interview methodically, praising Peyton and his team—he would hate the praise—and deflecting comments about their injuries, losses. As if Hernandez hadn’t always been a ticking time bomb, if Gronk wasn’t always getting hurt, if Wes hadn’t always had a horrible relationship with Belichick. People always forgot, when you did so well for so long, how human you could be. Part of him wanted to admit, right then, in Peyton’s house with the cameras flashing, that the reason he’d done so poorly today was his broken heart. Maybe Peyton would pretend to care, and he would feel a little better. But the questions. Not that he would tell. He didn’t want to ruin their careers, no matter how much more sensitive and kind the Broncos’ organization seemed to Peyton.  
    They still texted, occasionally, safe stuff, boring stuff, nothing like what they used to. Tom had started it—we were known as friends, he said, and it’d be weird if we just stopped. But lately, he wanted more. Maybe it was a sign of his age—he only had a few more years, and he’d finally realized that some things are more important than the game. Peyton had always realized that, but now, he guessed, Peyton’s house of cards was imprisoning him, and he had no way to escape. And that’s why they parted.  
Someone asked him about his Super Bowl plans, and he was dumbstruck. He wanted to see him win, but as a player? He bullshitted the answer perfectly—Belichick would be proud—and yet some part of him, that rebellious romantic, started wishing he could be the after game kiss—he wanted Peyton to win so bad. So as he stood there, blabbering robotically, he made two decisions—he’d text Peyton, wish him the best, be a good supportive ex-boyfriend who really, really wants it all back, and he’d talk to people about coming out. He’d never seriously considered it, not like Peyton had before he’d convinced him otherwise.  
    Belichick wouldn’t like it, because he’d actually have to pretend to care about all this stuff, but he knew some people would. Giselle would support him because she was tired of what hiding did to him. Wes would die for him, and with his weird, boyish charm, he’d probably convince the Broncos to do so as well—maybe it’d help his matchmaking plans. Julian would follow Wes, and Amendola, he was pretty sure, had something with Bradford at one point. Gronkowski would make really shitty jokes, but shitty jokes he can handle. And the rest of them? The rookies, the transfers, the ones he’s not so sure about? Peyton said one time that there was probably one gay guy on every team, so hopefully they’d understand. People respect him, for all he’s done, so maybe this will just make him one of the best quarterbacks of the game, the one who just happens to be gay. Peyton would support him the most, and hopefully that would convince everyone else. Peyton had always had some sort of strange charm that won people over.  
     The last question came, something stupid, yet he answered with a smile. A plan in the works now, a half-baked one that might get him killed, but he’s got four or five years left, at most, less if his knee wants to act up again. He doesn’t want to spend forty years of his life hiding. Lately, that feeling’s been bubbling up in him, and he couldn’t put a name on it until now. He’s Tom fucking Brady for godsakes’. He’s dated supermodels—even if he is gay—and made one of the best quarterbacks to ever play fall in love with him. He just happened to fall in love back. Maybe that will be his undoing. But maybe it won’t. People should want to be him. So maybe it’s about time he wanted to be himself.  
     As he left the podium, cameras followed him. He should feel sad, and part of him does. A large part, really, but that’s because it joins his broken heart. And he’s known, for a while, that he needs to fix this mess, but football always ends up first. It’s distracted him, from that empty feeling he gets when he’s been away from Peyton too long. Somewhere along the way he spent too much time putting football first and lost the godsend football had given him.  
     Wes appeared out of nowhere then; he’d forgotten the man’s ability to appear whenever you precisely didn’t want him. He wanted to tell him to leave, that he was sulking, that he should’ve gotten his gloating done on the field. He was wearing his championship gear, but he wore it like he had no clue that it might affect Tom. He was smiling like an idiot, like one of his insane plans has worked out. Then he realized he was the plan. So he slugged him on the shoulder and gave him a hug, wishing him luck at the big game. He hoped they win. There’s no one else he’d rather lose to, in the end, and, in the end, whatever the score was, he won something else. And Tom loves winning. 


End file.
